Tatiana Iglesias on Hogao and the Smell of Home

A kitchen conversation with Chef Tatiana

Tatiana Iglesias is a Venue Manager & Chef and a frequent contributor to Great Performances’ Chefs’ Choir(SM) series. She represents Colombia, where hogao — a traditional creole sauce — is a foundation of everyday cooking.

Dish: Hogao (Colombian Creole Sauce)
Country: Colombia

Hogao is a traditional Colombian creole sauce made with tomatoes, onions, scallions, and spices. It’s used as a base for soups, stews, and beans, and served as a topping across countless dishes — a true “mother sauce” in Colombian kitchens.

Hogao is typically made to keep on hand and used throughout the day, rather than for a specific season or celebration. It’s part of daily cooking and appears wherever it’s needed.

Try Chef Tatiana’s Hogao Recipe

GP: Do you have a personal favorite way to serve hogao?

Tatiana: Yes — with arepas. You put the salsa on the top and that’s it. We don’t need anything else.

GP: Are there any specific memories connected to it for you?

Tatiana: I remember the smells. Coming home from school, I could smell it through the door. The entire house would smell like hogao. It made me happy to smell it because it made me remember when I was a child.

GP: Are there any common mistakes people make when cooking it?

Tatiana: Yes — you need to be patient. It’s about respecting the ingredients and cooking it slowly for a long time.

GP: Why did you choose this dish to share?

Tatiana: Because I just made it not too long ago and I thought it was a good idea. But we always have it at home. I have it in a jar, sometimes in the freezer. It’s something that I always have.

GP: Why is this sauce important to Colombia?

Tatiana: This sauce was made by the native indigenous peoples before, so it’s more of a traditional thing that we’ve been using forever. The Spanish added garlic and scallions, but this dish has evolved with us over time.

GP: Is there anything about Colombian cuisine that you think people should know?

Tatiana: Arepas are from Colombia, not Venezuela. (laughs) No — mentiras. I’m kidding. Colombia is a beautiful country and we have a lot of culinary there. You shouldn’t be afraid to travel and try to go there and eat all the good things that we have, despite the bad reputation. It’s really a safe place to go and enjoy.

GP: If someone were visiting, what should they try?

Tatiana: It depends on the city because we have regions and every region has its own thing. Definitely la bandeja paisa, which is from Medellín. Ajiaco, a chicken soup from Bogotá. And arepas, of course — all kinds of arepas. We have arepa de huevo, which is an arepa with a fried egg inside. With sweet corn, normal corn. We have a million different kinds of arepas.

This conversation took place as part of Great Performances’ 2026 Food Festival series.